Mr. Séamus Dooley:

I agree with the Senator that many of those cuts have been imposed without negotiation, which is inappropriate. There are norms that the State expects. If the State is assisting any sector, and I say that as a member of the executive of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, ICTU, then there has to be a correlating respect for the norms.

In terms of freelancers, we must recognise that a significant number of journalists in this country are freelance and there should be some kind of innovation fund.

The Simon Cumbers fund that I mentioned is an interesting example of the kind of supports that could exist. There is no reason at all that there should not be a State innovation to fund that.

One of the issues that has frequently arisen has been bogus self-employment. We addressed that in RTÉ largely by means of the Eversheds Sutherland review, which is still on the way. I am very glad we did because there was a swathe of workers who were then protected and were enabled to apply for the State support schemes. Many other freelancers were excluded and the only way that they could look for aid was to go for jobseeker's allowance. If they qualified for that, then they could not work at all. That does not make sense. We do need another approach. I echo what Mr. Purcell said, that we do not need that in two years' time. People are leaving the profession and we are losing good journalists because they cannot afford to be journalists.